Truck Buck

Hunt Story

On the morning prior to this hunt our Moultrie mobile camera sent an image of this big 10-point in the road eating corn at 9:00 am! I proceeded to ask my friends if they wanted to go up with me and they all had prior commitments. I called my wife and texted her the picture and advised her I was heading up to try my luck with this 10-poit. I pulled into our place at 11:15 p.m. after an 8-hour drive from Homestead, FL. I headed out to the stand at 7:15 a.m. and upon reaching the stand realized I had forgotten a torx screwdriver that my buddy Tony had advised me to take. I had to remove 3 screws that were holding a piece of wood on the backside shooting window of our stand. I dropped off all my gear at the stand and briskly walked back to the new golf cart about 100 yards away. When I placed the cart in reverse a loud beeping noise that we forgot to disconnect started to go off. Sounded like a car stereo full blast. I immediately drove backwards and clicked the button in forward silencing the beeping sound and drove slowly for about 100 yards and then poured the pedal to the metal. When I arrived at camp I found the torx bit that my wife had placed in the truck, but I still needed the screwdriver to use it. I looked feverishly for the screwdriver that uses the torx and found it at the bottom of a container in the garage. I took off for the stand and by this time I was sweating pretty good. I parked the golf cart this time so I wouldn’t have to back it up again and ran as quickly as possible back to the stand. Took off the wood panel that was blocking the back shooting window and finally sat down and started to relax. By 7:50 a.m. I was set and ready for the day’s hunt. The wind was in my face at about 5 mph. Temperature was about 55 degrees and was now feeling very nice. Then at 8:20 a.m. a big doe popped out into the shooting lane coming from the Little River. I placed the crosshairs of my scope using 6 power on the doe as she walked across the shooting lane and followed her to the other side. She then turned around and came back out to the center of the shooting lane and stood there eating corn. While using my Howard Leight power muffs that I use while shooting my 7mm rem mag with a muzzle brake I started to hear branches and limbs breaking from 100 yards away. I thought more does were coming into the road when all of a sudden I saw this huge 10-point (looked like the walls of a dark brown log cabin) walk into the shooting lane and started to posture as he slowly crossed the shooting lane. The scope power at 6 allowed me to see the entire buck, and I placed the crosshairs on the front shoulder, but he then started to quarter away from me and I didn’t wait a second. I fired the rifle hitting him on the left side and watched him walk away toward my left and into a slough. After about 15 minutes I checked the area where I had shot the deer and noticed a good amount of blood. (Thanks to my Core Lokt bullets) I called my neighbor Perry and his wife Jackie to assist me in retrieving this buck. We tracked the deer for 30 yards from where he was shot. What a beautiful day to shoot my first buck ever since I started hunting at age 12. First buck I’ve ever killed. I just love watching them, and I wanted to wait on huge buck. Never even pulled the trigger on a buck before. I’ve passed a lot of bucks over 37 years of hunting and had a few mistakes along the way, but I always told my friends and family that I would shoot a buck when it was a big one, and this was a big one for sure. My neighbor, who is really good at measuring, measured twice, and it came out to 181 2/8; net score of 171. Daryl Mund